Posts Tagged d2ckey
Wii chip delays, and alternatives
Argh. OK, so it’s been a while since I ordered my Wasabi+wii-clip combo, and it *was* a pre-order, but due to Team Wasabi having delays at their manufacturers, I still don’t have it.
I’ve been keeping in touch with Jay at ConsoleChips where I pre-ordered at, and the new d2pro9 chip seems to be a better option all-round than the Wasabi chip. But! The d2pro9 can’t be firmware flashed via dvd-rom without some extra piece of kit that needs to be soldered onto the chip, and for a short time there was no wii-clip for it either.
So, I finally got fed up, and asked for options. My requirements were simple:
- I want to solder as little as possible onto the actual Wii’s board
- The chip must be D2C compatible
- The chip must be able to allow me to play NTSC games on a PAL console
- I want to be able to firmware upgrade the chip via DVD
The answer? There are no chips, currently, that can do all four. Most do only two or three of them. Even the Wasabi didn’t manage to do “No soldering” if I wanted region-free functionality (which was the point after all).
However! The d2ckey, the first chip to work on the D2C chipset drives, does the first three. In fact, it requires NO soldering AT ALL if used with a wii-clip. So its firmware can’t be update via DVD, or at all, but so far, it’s not had to, at all. So that’s what we agreed on. Jay immediately packaged up and despatched the D2CKey soldered onto its wii-clip, and refunded me the difference of cost.
I must say, Jay‘s been great, he kept in contact and offered alternatives when my request didn’t work out.
Wasabi Wii chip ordered
After my previous rant about NTSC games being much cheaper than PAL ones, I hunted around for somebody that can sell me a pre-soldered Wasabi Wii modchip soldered onto a Wii-Clip V5. I decided that the Wasabi chip is the way to go as it has less wires to solder (OK, this wasn’t a big concern for me, but still), and it also contained an easy-to-upgrade firmware process, when necessary. I didn’t want to end up with a chip that I couldn’t flash after getting that NTSC Mario Kart, and it doesn’t work on the chip.
I also decided that using the Wii-Clip V5 was the better option, even at the slightly higher price tag, as it allowed me to add the modchip to my Wii without doing any actual soldering inside the Wii.
Finally I managed to find a guy in the UK that would solder the Wasabi modchip into the Wii-Clip V5 for me, and ship it all to me at a reasonable rate. Jay over at Console-Chips was quick to respond on emails, and I pre-ordered his Wasabi Modchip Wii-Clip V5 pre-order bundle. I’ll update again once I get the chip. Should be in the next 2 weeks or so.
UPDATE:
Argh, OK, looking at the Wii-Clip V5 install diagrams (recently updated it seems), it turns out there’s a single wire that needs to be soldered inside the Wii. I really wanted to avoid having to solder anything inside the actual Wii console, but I suppose one wire is better than 9.
UPDATE 2:
Turns out the Wasabi chip is (a) not as upgradeable as advertised, and (b) in a bit of a short supply. See my follow-up on why I ended up getting the D2CKey intstead.
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